Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean,

I am contacting you to appeal to drop ANAT101 of the Winter term 2017.

This past year I have continuously been knocked down and struggled to get back up again. I had visited a counselor at the student health services a couple times in first semester and found no help. The advice I was given, rather than try your ABC¿¿s (a common technique used by therapists) I was given ¿¿when you don¿¿t feel like getting out of bed, just do it¿ and ¿¿maybe you should quit school¿. Upon hearing this, once I stopped being distraught, I decided that I could probably handle this on my own. However, on March 29th my friend, Justin Regular, passed away. This absolutely shattered my world. My perfect attendance for the winter term changed to no attendance as I was too distraught to even leave my home on most days. When situations like this arise it is usually my first instinct to shut down. Since there were only four weeks left in the semester I decided to try and stick it out until I returned home.

Although this situation did make it hard to perform on all of my exams, the one exam that I found it impossible to complete to my academic ability was the Anatomy 101 exam. The first portion of the exam is a bell ringer in which there are real cadavers. Justin passed of an asthma attack in his sleep and every time I thought about looking into a cadaver and seeing lungs, the things that failed him too early brought me to tears and full blown panic attacks. Studying for this exam was next to impossible as the best way to study was to attend the lab, which I could not bring myself to do after his passing.

I know that usually a death certificate is needed to prove the passing of someone, however, considering what this family has been through I cannot bring myself to ask for one. Justin is the second son the family has lost (their youngest passing away from cancer) as well as this year they lost a nephew after losing their home in the Fort McMurray fire. To ask for a death certificate from them would be the least empathetic thing I could do at this point and I do not feel as if I could do that to them in their time of grieving.

My plan to remedy this, assuming this appeal is accepted, is to take the online anatomy class rather than the in lab course as it is still a requirement for my Health Studies Minor. I also am looking into therapy sessions with my old therapist as well as other coping strategies.

Thank you for your time, and I look forward to hearing from you.

Jacqueline Keele